Plum Island sits just about eight miles from the shores of southeastern Connecticut, yet this 840-acre island off the north fork of Long Island exists as a world apart.

Best known as the home of the Plum Island Animal Disease Center — a high-security federal laboratory dedicated to the study of contagious livestock diseases — the island has long been the subject of mystery and wild speculation from conspiracy–mongers convinced that more sinister kinds of work are going on there. The lab complex, though, occupies only a small portion of the pork-chop-shaped island, with most of the rest left to forest, dune and meadow habitat.

Plans for a new lab in Manhattan, Ks., and a government sale of the island were announced in 2009. Since then, conservation groups including the Connecticut Fund for the Environment-Save the Sound have been lobbying for its preservation, calling attention to it as a rare natural haven for endangered roseate terns, harbor seals and other wildlife in the midst of Long Island Sound and the populous places that ring the estuary, from New York City to Long Island to the Connecticut shoreline.

“So many people have these misconceived ideas about what Plum Island is. They think of monsters,” said John Sargent, a Waterford artist who has visited the island a dozen times in the past 18 months. “They have no idea about the beauty out there, the diversity of ecosystems and habitats.”

Sargent, 67, a retired art teacher with a studio at his Quaker Hill home, and Bob Lorenz, 69, a retired commercial photographer who divides his time between Old Saybrook and New York City, have made it their unique and complicated mission to showcase the island’s beauty to the wider world. “The Natural Beauty of Plum Island,” an exhibit of 60 paintings and photographs by Lorenz and Sargent at the Groton Public Library through May 1, depicts landscapes of open beaches, bluffs dotted with cliff swallow nests, a forested freshwater pond, rocky coves where seals perch and offshore scenes of kayakers, fishermen and passing ferries.

“The point was to give the public a different perspective, and to consider a future for the island that might be something other than being sold to the highest bidder,” said Lorenz.

A reception for the artists will take place Saturday, followed by a presentation titled “Preserving Plum Island for Future Generations” by Chris Cryder, special projects coordinator for Save the Sound, on Tuesday. The exhibit, which previously hung at the Waterford Public Library, will travel next month to the Southold Historical Society on Long Island to go on display from May 9 to 30, and after that will spend July and August at the conference center on the island, said Jason Golden, public affairs officer for the lab.

“There’s a huge amount of traffic of scientists through that conference center,” Lorenz said. “It’s the preeminent facility of its kind.”

To keep the exhibit intact, the two are currently not selling the works. Sargent said they also decided that sharing their works as a kind of public service without an economic motive would improve their chances of getting the access they sought.

“We didn’t want to confuse the message to the folks on Plum Island,” he said.

The two met in August 2013 on a boat trip to the island sponsored by Save the Sound, each carrying the props that revealed their shared mutual interest. Getting permission from the federal Department of Homeland Security officials to use his cameras on the trip was no easy task, Lorenz said, and Sargent’s sketch book and pencils also were scrutinized.

“There were certain things I wasn’t supposed to sketch,” recalled Sargent.

After the trip, they decided to seek permission for a series of visits to the island to experience it from dawn to dusk, through winter, spring, summer and fall in all types of weather.

“It was a unique request,” Golden said. “But we were open to it, because we thought it was a unique way to tell the Plum Island story.”

Over the next 18 months, Sargent and Lorenz would be notified about three weeks before each trip of the day they would be allowed access, what time they should be at the Old Saybrook ferry that takes employees there, and how much time they would be able to spend.

“We explained that we wanted to paint and photograph the undeveloped parts of the island, and that piqued their interest,” Lorenz said. “We’d be escorted the entire time we were out there. We would have two to three hours there each time, including the checking in and checking out.”

Unable to linger at will, Sargent and Lorenz had to be focused and efficient with their time there, working independently in each location. Sargent used a sketchbook and camera to capture scenes he would put on canvases with acrylics or pastels in his studio, while Lorenz finessed the best of the numerous photos he took at the New York studio he shares.

“These were fast trips,” Lorenz said. “It was challenging to only be out there for short times, and not at your own choosing.”

Sargent said his time on Plum Island left him both with a strong appreciation for the natural beauty of the island, as well as of the scientists who work there. 

“In the course of this experience, I gained respect for the lab and what they do there, and why they keep it off limits,” he said.

Many of the subjects they photographed and painted have stories behind them — the security officer’s hand that shows up in one photo, holding a shell he found for his daughter; the wide, pristine beach empty of people except on the day of the lab’s annual picnic; the seals that gathered around them the day they circumnavigated the island in a 17-foot Boston Whaler.

“There were about 40 seals, and they seemed to be sending us a message that this is their special place,” Sargent said. “I’ve always admired artists who have a sense of place.”

j.benson@theday.com

Twitter: @BensonJudy

If you go

What: Meet the artists reception

Who: John Sargent and Bob Lorenz

When: 2 to 4 p.m. April 11

Where: Groton Public Library, 52 Newtown Road

Admission: Free

What: "Preserving Plum Island for Future Generations," a virtual tour through video and pictures

Who: Chris Cryder, special project coordinator for Save the Sound

When: 7 p.m. April 14

Where: Groton Public Library

Admission: Free

More information: Call the library at (860) 441-6750 

PLUM ISLAND LAB WON'T CLOSE UNTIL 2023 

The federal government's plan to vacate the animal disease lab on Plum Island and sell the property is still several years away from being executed. 

Though the decision was made in 2009, the General Services Administration and the Department of Homeland Security, the two agencies involved, are projecting the move won't be completed until 2023, according to information on the GSA's website. The next step is for the two agencies to reach an agreement on the final terms and conditions of the sale. 

Groundbreaking for construction of the new lab in Manhattan, Ks., which would be called the National Bio & Agro-Defence Facility, is scheduled for the end of May. The new lab could be complete by 2020, depending on the availability of funds, the GSA said. After completion, the move would take another three years to complete. 

— Judy Benson